Douglas B. Craig. After Wilson: The Struggle for Control of the Democratic Party, 1920-1934 (1992)online edition see Chap. 6 "The Problem of Al Smith" and Chap. 8 "'Wall Street Likes Al Smith': The Election of 1928"

The electoral votes of North Carolina and Virginia had not been awarded to a Republican since Barry Goldwater in 1964. In all, Smith carried only six of the eleven states of the former Confederacy (the lowest number carried by a Democratic candidate since the end of Reconstruction) in 1877.

The heavy Democratic losses were in the three Southern sections (

But, despite this evidence of a great Democratic vote, the overwhelming defeat of Smith in the electoral college and the retention of so few Democratic counties truly reflected the greater appeal of the Republican candidate. Smith only won the electoral votes of the Deep Southern States of the Democratic Solid South (plus Robinson's home state of Arkansas) and two New England states with a large proportion of Catholic voters (Massachusetts and Rhode Island). Hoover even triumphed in Smith's home state of New York by a narrow margin. Smith only carried 914 counties, the lowest in the Fourth Party System. The Republican total leaped to 2,174 counties, a greater number than in the great overturn in 1920.

But notwithstanding the great Democratic loss in number of counties for the nation, there was actually a greater number in 5 of the sections. Of these counties, 14 had never been Democratic and 7 had been Democratic only once. The size and the nature of the distribution of the Democratic vote shows, as nothing else so clearly, the strength and the weakness of the appeal of the Smith candidacy.

Smith had nearly as many votes as Coolidge had polled in 1924, and his vote exceeded the Davis vote of 1924 by more than 6,500,000. The Democratic vote was greater than in 1924 in 2,080 counties while it fell off in 997 counties. In only one section did the Democratic vote drop below 38%, and that was the Pacific section, which was the only section in which the Republican percentage exceeded 60%.

It is a matter of considerable importance that Smith polled more votes than any previous Democratic candidate in all but 18 states (Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Washington). In only 4 of these states (Tennessee, Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico) was his vote less than that of Davis in 1924.

Slightly less than 400,000 of this large vote was polled for "other" party candidates. Third-party protest had sunk to almost the vanishing-point, and the election of 1928 proved to be a two-party contest to a greater extent than any other in the Fourth Party System. All "other" votes totaled only 1.08% of the national popular vote. The Socialist vote sank to 267,478, and in 7 states there were no Socialist votes.

The total vote exceeded that of 1924 by nearly 8,000,000. It was nearly twice the vote cast in 1916 and nearly three times that of 1896. Every section in the Union increased its vote, the Mountain and East and West South Central sections least of all. The greatest increases were in the heavily populated (Northeastern)Mid-Atlantic and East North Central sections, where more than 4,250,000 more votes were cast, more than one-half of the increase of the nation. There was an increase of over 1,000,000 each in the states of New York and Pennsylvania.

Hoover won the election by a wide margin on pledges to continue the economic boom of the Coolidge years. Hoover polled more votes than any candidate of the Republican Party had ever polled in every state except 5: Rhode Island, Iowa, North Dakota, South Carolina, and Tennessee.[26] The Hoover vote was greater than the Coolidge vote in 2,932 counties; it was less in 143 of the comparable counties.[27] The Hoover vote also touched the high-water mark for all votes for a presidential candidate up to that time; 21,400,000 votes cast was an increase of more than 5,500,000 over the Coolidge vote of four years before.[1]

Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage for the winning candidate. Shades of red are for Hoover (Republican) and shades of blue are for Smith (Democratic), and shades of green are for "Other(s)" (Non-Democratic/Non-Republican).[25]

Results

Smith's religion helped him with Roman Catholic New Englandimmigrants (especially Irish-Americans and Italian-Americans), which may explain his narrow victories in traditionally Republican Massachusetts and Rhode Island, as well as his narrow loss in New York (which previous Democratic presidential candidates lost by double digits, but which Smith only lost by 2%).[24]

Due to these issues, Smith lost several states of the Solid South since Reconstruction.[22] However, in many southern states with sizable African American populations (and where the vast majority of African Americans could not vote at the time), many believed that Hoover supported integration, or at least was not committed to maintaining segregation, which in turn overcame opposition to Smith's campaign. During the race, Mississippi Governor Theodore G. Bilbo claimed that Hoover had met with a black member of the Republican National Committee and danced with her. Hoover's campaign quickly denied the "untruthful and ignoble assertion".[23]

An example was a statement issued in September 1928 by the National Lutheran Editors' and Managers' Association that opposed Smith's election. The manifesto, written by Dr. Clarence Reinhold Tappert, warned about "the peculiar relation in which a faithful Catholic stands and the absolute allegiance he owes to a 'foreign sovereign' who does not only 'claim' supremacy also in secular affairs as a matter of principle and theory but who, time and again, has endeavored to put this claim into practical operation." The Catholic Church, the manifesto asserted, was hostile to American principles of separation of church and state and of religious toleration.[20] A million copies of a bogus oath claiming that fourth degree Knights of Columbus had sworn to exterminate Freemasons and Protestants as well as commit violence against anyone if the church so ordered. [21] Smith's opposition to Prohibition, a key reform promoted by Protestants, also lost him votes, as did his association with Tammany Hall. Because many anti-Catholics used these issues as a cover for their religious prejudices, Smith's campaign had difficulty denouncing anti-Catholicism as bigotry without offending others who favored Prohibition or disliked Tammany's corruption.[19]:312–313

Anti-Catholicism was a significant problem for Smith's campaign. Protestant ministers warned that he would take orders from the pope who, many Americans sincerely believed, would move to the United States to rule the country from a fortress in Washington, D.C., if Smith won. According to a popular joke, after the election he sent a one-word telegram advising Pope Pius XI to "Unpack".[18][19]:309–310 Beyond the conspiracy theories, a survey of 8,500 Southern Methodist Church ministers found only four who supported Smith, and the northern Methodists, Southern Baptists, and Disciples of Christ were similar in their opposition. Many Americans who sincerely rejected bigotry and the anti-Catholic Ku Klux Klan—which had declined during the 1920s until the 1928 campaign revived it—justified their opposition to Smith on their belief that the Catholic Church was an "un-American", "alien culture" that opposed freedom and democracy.[19]:310–312,317

The fall campaign

General election

The Prohibition Party Convention was held in Chicago from July 10 through July 12. Smith openly opposed Prohibition.[17] Some members of the Prohibition Party wanted to throw their support to Hoover, thinking that their candidate would not win and that they did not want their candidate to provide the margin by which Smith would win. Nonetheless, William F. Varney was nominated for president over Hoover by a margin of 68–45.

Smith was the first Roman Catholic to gain a major party's nomination for president, and his religion became an issue during the campaign. Many Protestants feared that Smith would take orders from church leaders in Rome in making decisions affecting the country.[15][16]

The leadership asked the delegates to nominate Sen. Joseph Taylor Robinson of Arkansas, who was in many ways Smith's political polar opposite, to be his running mate, and he was nominated for vice-president.[13][14]

With the memory of the Teapot Dome scandal rapidly fading, and the current state of prosperity making the party's prospects look dim, most of the major Democratic leaders, such as William Gibbs McAdoo, were content to sit this one out. One who did not was New York Governor Al Smith, who had tried twice before to secure the Democratic nomination.[12]

In his acceptance speech a week after the convention ended, Secretary Hoover said: "We in America today are nearer to the final triumph over poverty than ever before in the history of this land... We shall soon with the help of God be in sight of the day when poverty will be banished from this land."[9]

The Republican Convention, held in Kansas City, Missouri, from June 12 to 15, nominated Hoover on the first ballot. With Hoover disinclined to interfere in the selection of his running mate, the party leaders were at first partial to giving Dawes a shot at a second term, but when this information leaked, Coolidge sent an angry telegram saying that he would consider a second nomination for Dawes, whom he hated, a "personal affront."[7] To attract votes from farmers concerned about Hoover's pro-business orientation, it was instead offered to Senator Curtis, who accepted. He was nominated overwhelmingly on the first ballot.[8]

In the few primaries that mattered, Hoover did not perform as well as expected, and it was thought that the president or Vice-PresidentCharles G. Dawes might accept a draft in case of a deadlock, but Lowden withdrew just as the convention was about to start, paving the way for a Hoover victory.[6]

In the end, the Republicans were identified with the booming economy of the 1920s, whereas Smith, a Roman Catholic, suffered politically from Anti-Catholic prejudice, his anti-prohibitionist stance, and the legacy of corruption of Tammany Hall, with which he was associated. The result was a third consecutive Republican landslide.[2] Hoover narrowly failed to carry a majority of former Confederate states, but nonetheless made substantial inroads in the traditionally DemocraticSolid South. This would be the last election until 24 years later in which a Republican won the White House.[3]

[1]

This article was sourced from Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. World Heritage Encyclopedia content is assembled from numerous content providers, Open Access Publishing, and in compliance with The Fair Access to Science and Technology Research Act (FASTR), Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., Public Library of Science, The Encyclopedia of Life, Open Book Publishers (OBP), PubMed, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, and USA.gov, which sources content from all federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial government publication portals (.gov, .mil, .edu). Funding for USA.gov and content contributors is made possible from the U.S. Congress, E-Government Act of 2002.

Crowd sourced content that is contributed to World Heritage Encyclopedia is peer reviewed and edited by our editorial staff to ensure quality scholarly research articles.

By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. World Heritage Encyclopedia™ is a registered trademark of the World Public Library Association, a non-profit organization.